Wow, I really have been crap about updating this space recently, eh?
Mostly, I think, I’ve been overwhelmed by my academic workload; teaching only two days a week seems like a good idea, but in execution it can be a little tricky… particularly when you’ve got three classes in a seven-hour block on those two days. I fell very, very behind on my grading for a couple of weeks in there, and while I’m caught up now, I’m still dealing with all of the other things I put off while I was, erm, not grading.
(And it wouldn’t be so bad if I had a decent excuse, like “I’ve been partying the nights away for weeks” or “I got really, really drunk, and then stayed that way for a month” or even “My car was comandeered by Vermont secessionist forces and I had to walk back from Bennington”. But no. I’ve got essentially nothing to show for myself if you don’t count the nine bottles of wine I picked up in Niagara a couple of weekends ago.)
On the up-side, teaching’s fun again. Two of my classes are into basic combinatorics (in the strict sense: actually counting things), which I always enjoy. In my other course, yesterday’s lecture was about cryptography in general and RSA in particular, which often leads into some interesting discussions; one of my students clearly seems to have thought a lot about how one might get around computer security systems — a perfectly respectable pre-occupation, under certain circumstances.
For the weekend, I’m pondering a day-trip into Indianapolis to see a movie: Mirrormask has opened in Castleton somewhere today, and since it’s not likely to appear in town here for months (if at all), I might just take advantage of its relative closeness. Other thoughts include participating in NaDruWriNi:
…although what I’d be writing is a little up in the air. I’ve got a couple of research papers that want finishing, but that might not be in the exact spirit of the… event. There’s a couple of writing projects in which I’m already sort of engaged, but I’m not sure how public I want to go with them yet. I’ve had a few ideas for short stories lately, so maybe I’ll go with those. We’ll see.
If anyone has any ideas on finding cheap flights from the American Midwest to the Canadian Prairies over American Thanksgiving — where “cheap” currently means “under $600″, but would prefer to have a stricter definition — then please let me know.